Process and means for shearing or clipping animal fibres and forming them into a rope or sliver



Nov. 17, 1964 D. WALKER 3,156,952

PROCESS AND MEANS FOR SHEARING 0R CLIPPING ANIMAL FIBREZS AND FORMING THEM INTO A RGPE OR SLIVER Filed March 1, 1962 4 Sheets-Sheet l 4 FIG. 1-

INVENTOR:

Nov. 17, 1964 D. WALKER 3,156,952

FOR SHEARING OR CLIFPING ANIMAL. FIBRES NTO A ROPE! OR SLIVER PROCESS AND MEANS AND FORMING THEM I 4 Sheets-Sheet 2 Filed March 1, 1962 INVENTOR:

BY QJMLMJ a. J

Nov. 17, 1964 D. WALKER 3,156,952

PROCESS AND MEANS FOR SHEARING OR CLIPPING ANIMAL FIBRES AND FORMING THEM INTO A ROPE OR SLIVER Filed March 1, 1962 4 Sheets-Sheet 5 INVENETOR;

Nov. 17, 1964 D. WALKER PROCESS AND MEANS FOR SHEARING OR CLIPPING ANIMAL FIBRES Filed March 1, 1962 AND FORMING THEM INTO A ROPE OR SLIVER 4 Sheets-Sheet 4 Down/.0 WMLKEQ BY WW Q- INVENTOR:

United States Patent PRGEESS AND MEANS FUR SHEAREIG 0R CLIP- PlNG ANIMAL AND FURMENG THEM KN'EQ A RQIE SEWER Donald Walker, 58 Brantley Lane, Lightclifie, near Halifax, England Filed Mar. 1, 1962, Ser. No. 176,674 6 Elairns. (Cl. ES -15d) The invention has for its object to devise a new or improved process and means for shearing or clipping animal fibres and simultaneously forming them into a rope or sliver, being more particularly intended for handling fibres for ultimate conversion into worsted yarns.

Hitherto, the usual practice has been to pull the fibre or wool from the skins of sheep and similar animals, or to shear or clip direct from the animals, following which the wool is baled and transported. The wool is subsequently sorted, scoured and dried, after which it is carded and backwashed. Then, after two or three gilling operations it is combed to remove short fibres and neps chiefly created in the carding operation. After two further gilling operations a top is produced suitable for the spinning operations which follow to produce a worsted yarn. If the yarn is required in a coloured state, the white top is usually dyed and re-cornbed before spinning.

The aforesaid baling, scouring and drying processes cause the wool to become entangled and felted, resulting in much broken fibre in the carding and gilling operations, also the formation of neps which are small balls of the shorter fibres. The shortest fibres, neps and vegetable matter are removed by combing but the fibres remaining in the finished top show great variation in length not conducive to producing a good class worsted yarn.

Wool, however, naturally grows straight and parallel on the body of a sheep, and it is the endeavour of the present invention to take advantage of this fact and to preserve the parallel arrangement of the fibres by forming the latter into a rope or sliver simultaneously with or immediately following the shearing or clipping operation. By doing so, the expensive and wasteful carding operation is avoided and the variation in length of the fibres in the top is reduced to much smaller proportions, also the creation of neps is largely eliminated. These special features make dyeing before combing possible, thus cutting out the expensive re-combing process.

Accordingly the invention provides a combined process for shearing or clipping fibres from animals or from their skins and for forming them into a rope or sliver, which process includes the steps of clipping the fibres oh" the skin by power-driven shear blades in a clipper head, drawing the parallel cut fibres from said blades as a lap, giving said lap a preliminary light twist to from a sliver which can be drawn ofif, drawing this lightly twisted sliver along a flexible conveyor or other flexible support, giving said sliver additional twist, delivering it to packaging apparatus and forming it into a package.

The preliminary twist is sufficient to form the sliver and give it enough strength to be drawn away from the clipper head. The additional or real twist is inserted preferably by twisting and drawing-off rollers mounted at the stationary end of the flexible conveyor.

For drawing the cut fibres from the shear blades a single roller or one or more pairs of rollers may be used and may be carried on the clipper head. Said roller or rollers may be fluted or of any other suitable form, but preferably a pair of rollers with retractable pins are used.

A rotary funnel or twister with internal fingers, grooves or the like may be mounted on the clipper head or on the adjacent end of the flexible conveyor, and the latter may $155352 Patented Nov. 17, 1964 incorporate auxiliary rotary twister to maintain sulficient strength in the sliver for it to be drawn along.

In order that the nature of the invention and the manner of carrying it into efiect may be more clearly understood I shall now describe the process and one example of an apparatus for carrying it into effect with reference to the accompanying drawings, but I desire to make it clear that other suitable constructions of apparatus may be evolved for carrying out the invention and that I claim protection for all such constructions within the scope of the appended claims.

In these drawings:

FIGURE 1 illustrates how a skin may be clipped or sheared according to this invention;

FIGURE 2 is a general outline view of a complete apparatus according to this invention;

FIGURE 3 is a plan of the clipping head indicated in FIGURE 2.

FIGURE 4 is a vertical section through the clipping head taken mainly on the line IVIV in FIGURE 3, but with only a cover plate removed to show in full the two drawing-off rollers and their driving means;

FIGURE 5 is a broken perspective view of one of the drawing-off rollers illustrating its construction and operation;

FIGURE 6 is a detail view in vertical section of one of the auxiliary rotary twisters associated with the conveyor tube indicated in FIGURE 2;

FIGURE 7 is an end elevation of the twisting and drawing-oil mechanism indicated in FIGURE 2;

FIGURE 8 is a horizontal section taken on the line VIII-VIII in FIGURE 7; and

FIGURE 9 is a vertical section through the coiler packaging apparatus indicated in FIGURE 2.

FIGURES 1 and 2 illustrate how a skin S is laid on a table 1 which is supported in a base 2 and can be revolved by the operator, or by suitable power means under his control, while he guides the shears so that the cut can follow a roughly spiral path as shown in FIGURE 1 in order to give the longest possible continuous flow of cut fibres. In shearing a live sheep according to this invention, the animal would be laid on its side in a cradle and its upper-most side sheared in a spiral path, then the other side dealt with similarly. It will be understood that the whole apparatus is stopped each time shearing stops.

The clipping head consists of a housing 3 in which is journalled a driving shaft 4 which projects through a handle 5 and is held in driving connection at its outer end with a flexible drive shaft '7 by a screwed union 6. The shaft 4 drives through spur gears 8, 9 a crank device Ill whose crank pin 11 engages the slotted end 13 of an oscillator 12. This oscillator is pivoted on the housing by a ball-joint 14 and is connected to the movable shear lade 15 so as to reciprocate it against the fixed shear blade 16, the desired cutting pressure being produced by an adjustable screw device 17 pressing a ball against an arcuate groove in the oscillator.

The shaft 4 also drives through a worm is and worm wheel 19 a cross shaft carrying two chain wheels 20, 231 from which chains pass around chain wheels 22, 23 respectively secured on the shafts of preliminary drawingo'ff rollers 24, 25, to rotate these rollers in the directions indicated by the arrows in FIGURE 4. This chain drive is enclosed by a cover plate 3X. As more clearly shown in FIGURE 5, each of these rollers has a shell 26 which is driven by its chain wheel 22 or 23 and which has rows of holes 26X through which pins 27 mounted on pin bars 28 protrude and retract according to the movement of the ends of the bars 28 around sunken cam tracks such as 29 formed in stationary end plates such as 30. In FIG- URE 5 three pin bars only have been shown for clarity,

areasee 19 although FIGURES 3 and 4 provide for eight bars in each roller.

The cam tracks are arranged to project the pins outwardly at the positions shown in FIGURE 4 so that those in the lower roller pickup the cut fibres and lift them clear of (the shear'blades, whereupon the pins in the upper roller take up the fibres from the retracting pins of the lower roller and lift the lap of parallel fibres up to the level of a conveyor tube now to be described. The retracting of the roller pins facilitates the transfer of the wool fibres from one roller to the second and from that one to the tube. Preferably the upper roller '25 is located .with its centre .a little to the rear of that of the lower roller to assist'the transfer of the fibres from one to the other.

The housing 3 also supports a rotary funnel or twister 31 which has inwardly. projecting fingers 32 and which is driven by a belt 33 from a pulley 34 secured on the driving shaft 4. This whole clipping head can be made light enough to be manipulated in one hand of the operator.

.A flexible or articulated conveyor tube35 is connected atits'front and rear ends by any suitable form of universal jointto the housing 3 of the clipping head at the rear of the twister 31 and also toa stationary support frame 36. This tube is shown as being in sections connected by universal joints 37 which incorporate auxiliary rotary twisters 38 having inwardly projecting fingers 39. As shown in FIGURE 6 each twister is frictionally driven by a friction Wheel 4% secured on the-flexible drive shaft 7 which is supported by brackets 41 from the tube 35.

The weight of the conveyor tube and clipping head is substantially counterbalanced and supported by a rope or chain-42 which is secured to'an arm 43 extending from the frame 36 and which passes around pulleys 44, 45 from the latter of which hangs a balance weight 46.

The support frame 36 carries a twisting and drawingoff mechanism. As shown in FIGURES 7 and 8 this consists of two rollers 47, 48 journalled in bearing brackets 49 secured on a circular carrier frame t) which is rotatablymounted in the frame 36 and which is driven through its external ring of teeth 51 by a pinion 52 secured on a shaft 53. This shaft is supported in the frame 36 and driven through a-pulley 54 and belt 55 from a pulley 56 on the shaft of a variable speed electric motor 58 (see FIGURE 2). A further pinion 59 on the shaft 53 drives a ring gear wheel as which is rotatable upon a sleeve of the carrier frame 50 and which in turn drives through a bevel pinion 61 and gear wheels 62, 63 the upper roller 47. This roller drives the lower roller 48 through gear wheels 64, 65.

By the above described mechanism the rollers 47, 48 can be arranged to draw the rope or sliver of fibres through the conveyor tube at the desired speed and at the same time they are bodily rotated with their carrier frame to insert some twist into the rope or sliver R. The motor 58 also drives through pulleys 86, 87 and belt 88 the flexible "drive shaft 7.

A short tube 66 supported from the frame 36 leads the rope or sliver R toa coiler packaging apparatus which is of substantially known construction and commonly used in the textile trade. As shown more clearly in FIGURE 9 this consists of a casing 67 supporting a pair of feed rollers such as 68 which are geared together and driven through bevel pinions 69, 70, vertical shaft 71, pulley 72 and belt 73 from a pulley 74 on the output shaft of a gear box 75 driven by the motor 58. A gear wheel 76 secured on the shaft 71 drives through an intermediate wheel 77 an externally toothed plate '78 which supports a cylindrical coiler can 79 having a removable disc 80 with central rod 81. A further gear wheel 82 secured on shaft 71 drives an externally toothed coiler plate 83 whose inclined funnel 84- has its lower end disposed so as to circulate above the can 79 to one side of the rod 81, while its upper end is disposed on the axis of the plate 83 in register with an inlet hole 85 in the casing top located centrally beneath the feed rollers 68.

. Ey this means, as is well known, a rope or sliver of lightly twisted fibres can be coiled down into the can between its side wall and the rod, the coils being laid progressively round the can due to its slow rotation.

By means of the above described complete apparatus a continuous clipping of fibres still in their natural parallel formation is carried by the preliminary drawing-off rol lers 24, 25 into the conveyor tube 35 along which it is drawn asa rope or sliver R by the drawing-off rollers 47, ed. The funnel 31, auxiliary twisters 3S and twisting rollers 47, 4% all act to insert a false or temporary twist in the rope or sliver to give it sufiicient strength to be drawn through the conveyor tube, while the coiler can mechanism inserts suificient permanent twist to enable the rope or sliver to be drawn out of the can for subsequent treatment.

The ropes or slivers of fibres produced by this invention can be removed from the packaging apparatus and can be gillcd in the greasy state to form a more even lap. This lap can then be scoured in a suitable wash-bowl which carries the material through the scouring liquor between travelling perforated sheets inorder to maintain the parallel formation of the fibres which is such animportant feature of this invention. The material may then be dried, gilled and combed in the usual manner either before or after dyeing.

Instead of using the coiler-can form of packaging apparatus, the rope or silvermay be wound on to a reel or former or otherwise made up into a package suitable for further handling, provided that sufficient twist is inserted to give the necessary strength.

it will be seen that the complete apparatus can be drivenfrom one power source and can readily be provided with suitable speed controlmeans to enable the operator to regulate the speed of cutting according to the length of the fibres being cut at any particular time or for any other reason.

I claim:

1. A combined process for clipping fibres from animal skins and for forming them into a rope, which process includes the steps of clipping the fibres off the skin, maintaining said fibres substantially parallel and forming then into a lap, giving said lap a preliminary light twist to form said lap into a light twisted sliver, drawing said lightly twisted sliver away from the vicinity of the skin giving said sliver additional twist and whilst so twisted delivering it to a packaging point and there forming it into a package, whereby the original parallelism of the fibres on the skin is substantially maintained in the packaged sliver.

2. Combined means for clipping fibres from animal skins and for forming them into a rope, including a clipper head, power-driven shears in said head, at least one preliminary driven drawing-off roller operatively associated with said shears for drawing the cut fibres from said shears as a lap while maintaining said fibres substantially parallel, flexible support means along which said fibres are drawn from said preliminary roller, means adjacent to the front end of said support-means for inserting a preliminary li ht twist to said lap to form a rope, means adjacent the rear end of said support means for drawing said rope along said support means, for giving said rope additional twist and for delivering said rope to a packaging point while maintaining substantially the original parallelism of the fibres on the skin.

3. Combined means as called for in claim 2, wherein said preliminary drawin -off roller has fibre-engaging retractable projections around its circumference, and means for protruding and retracting said projections relative to the surface of said roller at predetermined parts oftheir rotary paths whereby to pick up and transfer said cut fibres.

4. Combined means. as called for in claim 2, including assess:

6 flexible drive shaft and drive transmission means for driving said shears, said preliminary drawing-off roller and said means for inserting a preliminary light twist.

5. Combined means as called for in claim 2, including a carrier frame mounted adjacent the rear end of said iiexible suppotr means, and wherein said means adjacent the rear end of said support means includes a pair of twisting and drawing-otf rollers journailed in said frame, means for rotating said rollers about their axes to draw said rope of fibres along said flexible support, and means for rotating said frame to cause said rollers to insert additional twist into said rope.

6. Combined means as called for in claim 2, including a tubular articulated conveyor constituting said flexible support means, at least one auxiliary rotary twister mounted on said conveyor for inserting a tditional twist into said rope, and a flexible drive shaft and drive transmission means for driving said shears, said preliminary dr Wingotf roller and said means for inserting a preliminary light twist and said auxiliary rotary twisters.

No references cited 

2. COMBINED MEANS FOR CLIPPING FIBRES FROM ANIMAL SKINS AND FOR FORMING THEM INTO A ROPE, INCLUDING A CLIPPER HEAD, POWER-DRIVEN SHEARS IN SAID HEAD, AT LEAST ONE PRELIMINARY DRIVEN DRAWING-OFF ROLLER OPERATIVELY ASSOCIATED WITH SAID SHEARS FOR DRAWING THE CUT FIBRES FROM SAID SHEARS AS A LAP WHILE MAINTAINING SAID FIBRES SUBSTANTIALLY PARALLEL, FLEXIBLE SUPPORT MEANS ALONG WHICH SAID FIBRES ARE DRAWN FROM SAID PRELIMINARY ROLLER, MEANS ADJACENT TO THE FRONT END OF SAID SUPPORT MEANS FOR INSERTING A PRELIMINARY LIGHT TWIST TO SAID LAP TO FORM A ROPE MEANS ADJACENT THE REAR END OF SAID SUPPORT MEANS FOR DRAWING SAID ROPE ALONG SAID SUPPORT MEANS, FOR GIVING SAID ROPE ADDITIONAL TWIST AND FOR DELIVERING SAID ROPE TO A PACKAGING POINT WHILE MAINTAINING SUBSTANTIALLY THE ORIGINAL PARALLELISM OF THE FIBRES ON THE SKIN. 